Thoughts on the Prayer Breakfast - part 2

“Do not give any of your children to be sacrificed to Moloch, for you must not profane the name of your God. I am the LORD.”

What was so bad about Moloch that God commands in the Old Testament that his worshippers should be obliterated from the face of the earth? Simple, Moloch demanded child sacrifice. The murder of children seems to infuriate God. Just ask the Germans who after the horrors of the 20th century, no longer seem able to reproduce. (Total Fertility Rate in Germany: 1.4) It is also striking to see that Jesus is infuriated in the New Testament by unkindness to children.

“And they were bringing children to Him so that He might touch them; but the disciples rebuked them. But when Jesus saw this, He was indignant and said to them, ‘Permit the children to come to Me; do not hinder them; for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.’” (Mark 10: 13-14)

The God of the Old Testament didn’t tell the Israelites to slaughter people because they weren’t the right religion. They were slaughtered for their “abominations,” among which was child sacrifice. There is no general command to spread the religion of Israel by the sword.
There is no command in the New Testament to spread the faith by means of the sword. I have told you about the idea of abrogation in the Quran that the later more warlike verses written in Medina cancel out the earlier more merciful verses written in Mecca. Christianity also has a kind of “abrogation.” It is the opposite of Quranic abrogation. Jesus ends the Old Testament practice of stoning, of revenge, of divorce and of the ban. These things were permitted because of the “…hardness of your hearts” (Matt.19:8), but no longer were they to be allowed. In the New Testament violence gives way to mercy.

The president talks about the Inquisition and the Crusades. Has he really studied them, or is he just making the same assumptions that most post TV thinkers make? I have written extensively about the Inquisition, claiming it was in fact a lifesaving committee! I don’t want to go into it all again. You can find what I’ve said by doing a web search for “Rev. Know it all - Is the History Channel correct about the evil Spanish ...” and “Rev. Know-it-all - How was the Spanish Inquisition a real life saver?” As for the Crusades, I refer you to an interesting YouTube presentation. Do a web search by typing in “Bill Warner, PhD: Jihad vs. Crusades YouTube”. You will be amazed. The Crusades lasted for about 200 years causing perhaps 20 or 30 major offensive battles fought by crusaders.

Remember, the Crusades were defensive wars fought against an aggressor who had been waging war on classical European civilization for hundreds of years. Remember too, that Egypt, Turkey, Syria, the Holy Land, Lebanon, Libya and Tunisia were the heartland of Christian civilization and had been thoroughly Christian for around 400 years, much longer than the United Stated has even been a nation. They were invaded by foreign aggressors from the Arabian Peninsula who took away their most basic freedom, that of religion.
The Crusades were wars waged when the threat of foreign invasion was at Europe’s doorstep and then they were waged only at the request of those about to be swallowed by a foreign invader. The act that precipitated the Crusades was the destruction of all the Christian places of worship in the Holy Land and the persecution of the Christian population by Hakim, the Fatimid Caliph of Egypt in 1009. Things improved slightly for the Christians of Jerusalem until the Muslim Seljuk Turks conquered the city and forbad all pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The First Crusade in 1095 was the response to invasion and subsequent religious persecution.
The armies of Islam are still waging war on Christians 1400 years later. In that period jihadists have waged at least 548 major offensive battles just against classical Mediterranean and European Christian society, with untold millions killed and at least one million Christians taken as slaves to be sold in the Muslim world. This is a practice that continues among Muslims in the Middle East and Africa to this day. Captured Christian girls as young as four are sold by the current Islamic Caliphate (ISIS) to buyers from all over the Muslim world and it was possible until recently to buy a captured Christian boy from southern Sudan for as little as $50. (Slavery Haunts Sudan CBS News 1/25/1999)

This sorry history does not include the jihadist battles fought in the rest of the world. Take India for instance, a land where there has been a Christian presence in coexistence with Hinduism since the time of Christ. Muhammad bin Qasim brought the armies of Islam to India in 712 CE, demolishing temples while slaughtering and enslaving masses of people. Despite this, his superior, Al-Hajjaj ibn Yusuf urged him to be still harsher. “Henceforth grant pardon to no one of the enemy and spare none of them, or else all will consider you a weak-minded man.” Al Hajjaj commanded that men be killed, and that children be imprisoned and retained as hostages. Qasim obeyed orders and went on to massacre perhaps 16,000 of the defending forces of the town of Brahminabad.